


a certain simplicity

by lahtays



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Alcohol, Drunk Kissing, Established Relationship, F/M, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, The Winter Palace (Dragon Age), there's a little angst but it's solavellan so what else is new lol
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-28
Updated: 2019-12-28
Packaged: 2021-02-26 07:20:23
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,126
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21999631
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lahtays/pseuds/lahtays
Summary: "Solas, as it turns out, is a terrible drunk."
Relationships: Female Lavellan/Solas
Comments: 5
Kudos: 62





	a certain simplicity

Solas, as it turns out, is a terrible drunk.

While the decadent halls of the Winter Palace seem far less inviting to her now after tonight’s events, Ashara has little time to concern herself with idle suspicion – not with the taller Elven man stumbling inebriated against her side as she guides him to his guest quarters.

 _Their_ guest quarters. A last-minute change of plans, one in which she is now beginning to somewhat regret.

“ _Easy_.” A little tipsy herself, Ashara can’t help but laugh as he sways precariously where he stands, despite the support of her arm wrapped around his middle. “One foot in front of the other, lethallin.”

Solas laughs too, though it is far from the light and easy-going thing she had witnessed in court only a few short ours before. Now his breath is low and hot against her ear, its tone suggestive enough to make the hairs on her arms stand on end.

“ _Ma serannas_ ,” he slurs slightly, still half laughing – or rather, _giggling_. “I confess it has been … some time since I last indulged to this degree. I _may_ have overdone it slightly.”

“At least you had the common sense to save it until _after_ the assassination was dealt with.” Ashara sighs. “ _Creators_. This Inquisition will be the death of me.”

“The death of an Empress, at the very least.”

“ _Cheerful_.”

“I am quite certain Celene would disagree.”

Ashara snorts, but drops the conversation as they reach the third door from the end of the hall - their door. She searches the pockets of her suit for the key, while Solas seems content to lean unperturbed against the wallpaper, regarding her with an absurdly overconfident smirk. He says nothing and shows no interest in moving, even as Ashara unlocks the door and holds it open for him. Her resulting groan of irritation seems to have little effect on him, besides making his grin appear even smugger.

“What?” She asks, rolling her eyes. “Is this the part where you boldly inform me of how _beautiful_ I looked tonight, just to see me blush?”

He chuckles, but finally resigns to step through the threshold of the doorway, leaning down to steal a mischievous kiss from her as he passes. Ashara shakes her head in bemusement and follows him through, then turns to shut and lock the door behind her. After the sorry affair with Florianne, she trusts Halamishiral about as far as she can throw it.

Solas is pressed up against her back before she can turn around again, his arms wrapping around her waist from behind and holding her snug against him. “I need not inform you of what you already know,” he teases against her ear. “And I can think of _far_ more satisfying ways to make you blush.”

“Is that so?”

“Mm-hmm.”

His buries his face into the crook of her neck, brushing aside her downed hair to kiss expertly against the exposed flesh of her throat. Ashara smiles in spite of herself and leans into his touch, feeling the tension in her shoulders beginning to lessen for the first time since the Empire’s peace talks began.

Already months into this strange entanglement of theirs, and Ashara still can hardly say she’s used to it. These stolen scraps of intimacy are few and far between, clung to in quiet moments when nobody is around to witness them. It isn’t a secret to hide, nor the source of some great shame or scandal; it is much more confidential, _confessional_ in nature than anything born out of politics. A sacred, private thing, belonging only to them.

 _And it is sacred_ , she thinks, surprised by how much she actually believes it. _Sacred, and special, and something else I haven’t felt before. Something important._

Even on nights like this, when the smell of wine is sharp on his breath, and his hands are beginning to work their way into the underside of her shirt.

She whirls around to face him in the hopes it might halt any further migrations, but remains pressed up close against his chest, much to his obvious delight. She laughs, threading her arms up around the back of his neck and pulling him into a devouring kiss. He reciprocates with impressive enthusiasm, humming pleased against her mouth and moving cup the side of her face with his hand as he presses deeper into her kiss.

“But perhaps I am being ungenerous,” Solas murmurs against her mouth, drawing back only after teasing her bottom lip with his teeth. “Would you _like_ me to tell you how beautiful you looked tonight, _vhenan_? Shall I confess to you all the terrible thoughts that crossed my mind when I saw you dancing amidst the court?”

His lips catch hers again before she can reply, harder this time and without the customary tells of his self-discipline. Soon enough she can feel his tongue grazing against her teeth, warring with her own in way so completely unlike him that she can’t help blink in confusion against the onslaught. _This isn’t right_ , she thinks as he captures her bottom lip with his teeth in full this time, sucking and teasing at the sensitive flesh. For a man who can hardly touch her sober without murmuring an apology, something is _definitely_ wrong.

And then Ashara feels his fingers slip under the lining of her pants, and common sense finally makes itself known to her.

She pulls back firmly, holding his shoulders in place to keep him from following suit. His face is flushed, eyes glazed, and already she knows better than to let her eyes trail downwards. Instead she squares her jaw, and regards him intently.

“Perhaps this is a bridge best crossed in the morning,” she says, willing patience in her voice. “When you’re sober, _ma lath_.”

Solas laughs, and in his dishevelled state, it truly is breathtaking. “Why wait?” he replies, with a boldness only possessed by the deeply intoxicated.

Ashara scoffs. “Because you are _astonishingly_ drunk, for a start. _And_ because I fail to recall a time in which you’ve ever indicated a clear-headed interest in such a thing.”

A flicker of something sad plays upon his brow only for a moment, though when he reaches to brush an idle hand through the dark curls of her hair, he does so with a sincerity that feels far more familiar to her than anything she has seen from him in the past hour.

“Do not mistake my restraint for a lack of interest, heart.” He says pleadingly. “It’s just -“

“ _Complicated_.” Ashara smiles up at him reassuringly, and then allows herself to run a hand up his chest, relishing the steady thrum of his heartbeat through the fabric. “You don’t ever need to justify yourself to me, Solas. Not about _that_. I only want what you are willing to give – _while sober_ , I should add.”

He closes his eyes and smiles at her words, shaking his head softly as if doing so might make his thoughts a little clearer. Ashara laughs low under her breath, and then guides him backwards into the mattress, sitting him down gently but firmly.

He runs a hand over his face as she crosses the room to the dresser, to pour him a glass of water from a crystal pitcher sitting atop it. She hands it to him wordlessly and he accepts, taking a small sip while keeping his eyes trained on the floorboards before them. Ashara sits beside him on the mattress, her hand rubbing comforting circles against his back for a few moments, before he finally sets the empty glass down and speaks.

“I so rarely know what I want these days.” There is a quiet waver in his voice, as if it’s a challenge to get the words out at all. “Tonight allows for a certain … simplicity. I _do_ want you; that much I surely know. And I will want you tomorrow, as well. _And_ the day after that, I’d imagine.”

Her hand abandons its place as his back, moving instead to intertwine her fingers with his, lifting them up to press her lips to the back of his knuckles.

“If that’s the case, then we can make the decision tomorrow. _Or_ the day after that.” She murmurs.

Solas shakes his head sadly. “I’m afraid I know what decision I will make tomorrow.”

“Then I know what decision I must make tonight.”

He says nothing, and Ashara knows that the debate has run its course.

Solas regards their interlaced hands for a moment before pulling his fingers free and sighing, falling back onto the mattress in a very _un-Solas-esque_ manner. He drapes his forearm over his eyes, appearing melancholic, but Ashara catches a small, embarrassed smile teasing the corners of his lips, and her heart lifts considerably.

“Are you going to be alright, _lethallin_?” She asks, still sitting upright at the foot of the bed. “I was considering joining Vivienne for the night. I believe she would appreciate a debrief of tonight’s events, at any rate.”

Solas lifts his hand from over his eyes to meet hers. “You aren’t staying?”

“I …wasn’t sure if it would be entirely appropriate.”

“Ah.”

“ _Should_ I?”

Solas props himself up by his elbows and tilts his head at her curiously, and Ashara resists the urge to roll her eyes at herself. Even in his current state, the effect his presence has on her is absurd.

“Don’t leave.” he says finally, gesturing to the vacant expanse of the mattress. “I would appreciate your presence, _vhena_ n. If it pleases you.”

Ashara looks towards the door, deliberating only for a moment before conceding that she already knows her answer.

“It pleases me,” she says with a bemused sigh, before beginning to undo the buttons of her suit. “So long as you remain on your _best_ behaviour.”

Solas hums, contented. “ _Ma nuvenin,_ Inquisitor.”

When she is suitably dressed down into her smallclothes, Ashara at last resigns to collapse back on the mattress, moving her body upwards and into his opened arms.

“Hello.” She smirks, her face a hairs breath from his own.

Solas laughs. “Hello.”

A warm, familiar silence stretches out between them, comforting and natural as it always is when shared between the two of them. Solas twirls a stray lock of her hair around his index finger idly, while Ashara closes her eyes, meditating on the sordid events of the night.

Or rather, _trying_ to. She had not been prepared for the banquet to actually _continue_ after Corypheus’s plans had been exposed - assassinated Empress or not, whatever potent wine they had been serving has more than done its job.

Eventually, she accepts that her thoughts are running in circles, and forces them to the back of her mind with only a little difficulty. _I’ll deal with the fallout in the morning_ , she thinks sleepily. _Famous last words._ For now, she is content to let her mind drift to other, more present matters.

“You could tell me, if you wanted to.” She murmurs abruptly, her eyes opening as the thought occurs to her.

“I’m sorry?”

“Your _‘complications’_ ,” she continues with a wry grin. “I meant it when I said you didn’t have to tell me. You don’t. But you _could_ , if you wanted to. I am _rather_ good at complicated.”

His smile falters near instantly, and he averts his gaze from hers just as quick. Ashara supresses a frown, and swallows her long held back suspicion once more.

 _Sacred, and special, and important_ , she reminds herself. _Don’t let this be another gift you ruin with your unwarranted mistrust._

“ _Ir abelas_. Not this type of complicated.” He says, whispered into the small space between them. “But your words are a comfort, nonetheless, my love.”

He offers nothing else, and Ashara bites back a sigh. “I understand,” she says, and means it. She understands walls well enough to recognize that his are made from the same cold steel as hers.

Solas finds her eye again, and holds it – searching, perhaps, for proof of that very understanding. When he finds it, he manages a smile once more; sadder, more sobered, but loving, too. He closes the space between them slowly, pressing his lips against hers in another soft, accepting kiss. Ashara hesitates for a moment, feeling the air around them for any remnants of his previous desire, and then relents, kissing him back deeply when she discerns nothing but love.

It’s a simple thing to fall asleep thing way, wrapped in Orlesian silk and each other’s arms. Later, as Solas begins to drift, Ashara observes him carefully, holding off her own incoming drowsiness with slow, languid blinks.

 _Sacred, and special, and important,_ she thinks once more as the Fade begins to claim her, too. _Something frighteningly close to love._

**Author's Note:**

> thank you so much for reading ! 
> 
> i've been writing so much in the last couple of weeks and i feel like my motivation to create has FINALLY resurfaced after..... like 8 years of intense writer's block lmao. i don't want to jinx it, but i AM hoping to be more consistent in sharing my writing in the new year, so wish me luck because i will definitely need it !
> 
> anyway as always it means a lot to hear all of your feedback and it has really encouraged me more than i can say ! so thank u all very much !


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